The theme of the second People’s Playlist quickfire quiz is the weather – and it’s remarkable how many more songs have been written about summer and sunshine than about gloom and rain. Even the collection of depressives and miserabilists that make up the rock music community can’t get worked up about fog or mizzle, with the honourable and obvious exception of Lindisfarne. The format is the same as before: 40 quick questions, and maybe get that egg-timer out again if you fancy an extra challenge.
Answers: here
1 Where does the title to this playlist come from?
2 Who wanted to know ‘Why Does It Always Rain on Me’ in 1999?
3 Who had a hit with a disco version of the sixties classic ‘Macarthur Park’ in 1978?
4 Who topped the album chart in 2010 with Messy Little Raindrops?
5 One side of Electric Light Orchestra’s 1977 album Out of the Blue consisted of four tracks called ‘Concerto for a Rainy Day’. What was the fourth track from the suite, which reached number six in the UK singles chart?
6 What was George Ezra’s interrogative first single?
7 Which U2 song was used as the theme tune to The Premiership, ITV’s Premier League highlights programme?
8 Sounds Good Feels Good was a chart-topping album for which Aussie power pop band?
9 Which 1984 single gave Don Henley his only UK Top 20 hit?
10 Who were lazing on a ‘Sunny Afternoon’ in 1966?
11 What was a UK number two hit for the Weather Girls in 1982?
12 Which Spice Girl went one better and took the same song to number one in 2001?
13 Where did the Sex Pistols like to holiday?
14 ‘Something in the Air’ was taken to number one in 1969 by which stormy band?
15 Where was it raining for Buddy Holly?
16 When did Mungo Jerry have their biggest hit?
17 ‘Here Comes the Rain Again’: whose observation in 1984?
18 Where did the sun always shine for A-Ha?
19 Who were the ‘Riders on the Storm’?
20 Robert van Winkle had his big hit ‘Ice Ice Baby’ under which cooler name?
21 Joe Zawinul played keyboards in which jazz fusion band of the seventies and eighties?
22 Who tried to think up 50 Words for Snow in 2011?
23 Which blues guitarist wrote the much-covered classic ‘Stormy Monday’ – or, to give it its full title, ‘Call It Stormy Monday (But Tuesday Is Just as Bad)’?
24 Who was ‘Frozen’ at the top of the UK singles chart in 1998?
25 The musical Jersey Boys tells the story of which vocal group?
26 What meteorological downer got to the Walker Brothers in 1966?
27 With which band was Cozy Powell the drummer between 1975 and 1980?
28 Which British R&B band, named after a Sonny Boy Williamson II song, had some success in the early eighties with their albums Don’t Point the Finger and Third Degree?
29 Who couldn’t live without the ‘Rain’ in 1976?
30 Before their success at Eurovision, what was Katrina & the Waves’ biggest hit?
31 Who had us thinking of ‘Little Fluffy Clouds’ in 1990?
32 Who advised us to Dodge and Burn in 2015?
33 ‘Oh, where have you been, my blue-eyed son?’ So begins which Dylan classic?
34 Where did the Lovin’ Spoonful spend their summer in 1966?
35 Whose first album brought a Howlin’ Wind in 1976?
36 ‘Here Comes the Summer’ was whose second single in 1979?
37 Who were concerned about ‘Fifteen Feet of Pure White Snow’ in 2001?
38 What was Snow’s big 1993 hit, reaching number one in the US and number two in the UK?
39 What, in 1987, was the first UK Top 10 single for the Jesus and Mary Chain?
40 Who wanted to Push the Sky Away in 2013?